Hit pointsHP

A vehicle's health pool, which cannot be restored in battle and is therefore a resource to be spent rather than a buffer to be refilled.

Also known as HP, health, hitpoints.

Hit points are removed by every penetrating shell, by high explosive blasts, by fire and by ramming. Nothing puts them back: no consumable, no repair, no capture. Once spent they are gone for the rest of the battle.

That makes hit points a currency. A heavy tank trading two shots for three is spending health to buy space, and the reason blocking damage is valued so highly is that armor is the only thing that lets a vehicle contest ground without paying.

Higher tiers carry more, and within a tier the heavier classes carry the most, which is part of why bottom tier battles play so differently.

Related terms

Damage blockedPotential damage that hit the player's armor and failed to penetrate, the ledger entry for playing a heavily armored vehicle well.Alpha damageThe damage a single penetrating shell deals, before the plus or minus 25 percent the game rolls on every shot.Survival rateThe share of battles a player finished alive, which reads as caution or as staying useful, depending on the rest of the account.Critical hitDamage to a module or a crew member, which degrades what a vehicle can do without necessarily costing it hit points.

Every World of Tanks term